“When the pandemic first started, and we were just beginning to hear information about the impact on farmworkers, we knew it was coming,” Partida says. “You just knew that it was going to get worse and worse and worse.”
With morning temperatures approaching 90 degrees one day in July 2015, a migrant laborer walking down rows of corn began to experience symptoms of heat exhaustion, including difficulty breathing and extreme nausea. The laborer was working near Boone, Iowa, for an independent contractor with the St.
Farmworkers laboring inside the United States are at risk for becoming victims of human trafficking thanks to a largely complex and opaque recruiting process, a new report has revealed.
The bed bug infestation at the Pine Creek migrant labor camp in Holland, Michigan, had become so bad by June that Tomas and Leonor Pizana turned their bedroom lights on before going to sleep.
Sexual assault and harassment is a common problem when it comes to migrant farm workers. Attorney Karla Altmayer has worked to fight sexual assault in the workplace since 2010. Recently, she held a workshop in Kankakee, Ill., for migrant workers.
A lack of enforcement or inspections and legal loopholes are leaving migrant workers in Iowa vulnerable, cheated of wages and living in substandard housing. The problems include wage theft, broken contracts, substandard housing, working arrangement violations and Agricultural Workers Protection Act
